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Black Screen and Cursor after 8.1 Update

Hey, all. I'm an IT Technician for a repair store, and I have stumbled across something absolutely frustrating. I'm sure that this has already been discussed, but I must know a few more things. I had a customer come in and request that we upgrade his Dell laptop (I will give the specs below) to Windows 8. That was all very well and good, and the install went off without a hitch. But a day later, the customer came back and said "put 8.1 on it." I, for one, and a H8tr. I absolutely despise Windows 8, 8.1, etc. But, being as the customer is always right, I obliged. After all of the Win8 updates were finished, it finally asked "do you want to upgrade to 8.1 for FREE?" I clicked yes, ok, continue, whatever, and installed 8.1. But alas, it was all in vain. Now, when I log the customer in, it only gives me this hateful black screen and cursor. I have done everything the entire interwebs has recommended, and then some. It hasn't changed a bit. I updated drivers, (tried to) refresh the pc, rollbacked the drivers, uninstalled the video drivers altogether, everything short of a fresh install. So please help me out here! The customer is getting anxious.

The problem lies that 8.1 is not loading drivers as it is supposed to be. Especially if you do a clean install. If Dell does not have the proper drivers, check the chipset manufacturer website for the latest drivers. If that does not work, the only fix is to roll them back to 8. Microsoft pulled 8.1 for a while, because of the issue with drivers not working correct with it, along with problems with the Surface tablets.

It is more of a hit or miss, if the machine will work with 8.1. I have not had any problems with 8.x. It is just like Vista, that people get it in their heads that the OS is the problem. It is when they run into problems like this, they make it sound like it is the OS that is the issue, when it is a manufacturer issue.

Intel & Microsoft of late have been having their indifference's, when 8 was being written. Intel is not even pushing Microsoft to fix multiple problems with the APU's, GPU's, sound & network drivers.

That is why I went with a AMD chipset based unit, with Realtek network, sound, card reader chipsets. The only change that I have made on mine, was a Crucial M500 SSD and a Intel 7260 Dual-Band Wireless-AC mini-card. No problems with the drivers for that, or errors from Windows 8.1.

When you roll the customer back to 8, block 8.1 from installing, make an image of the drive with either Clonezilla or another program that you use, and create a disc, that the customer can just put in their drive and load the working image of their OS.

Well, if I had a choice, I would go with an AMD, but this is a customers computer, so I can't really do anything. I just wiped it and told the customer to ignore any Windows 8.1 update notifications. I also had him turn off the Windows update (I know, it's a bad idea).